


Morphine

by CrumblingAsh



Category: Iron Man - All Media Types, Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Incredible Hulk - All Media Types
Genre: Aftermath of Torture, Alpha Bruce, Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, Alternate Universe - High School, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, BAMF Bruce Banner, Bruce Feels, Bruce Has Issues, Bruce Needs a Hug, Drabble Collection, Falling In Love, Howard Stark's A+ Parenting, Hurt Bruce, Hurt Tony, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Multi, Omega Tony, Past Rape/Non-con, Prompt Fill, Protective Bruce, Rape Aftermath, Tony Has Issues, Tony Stark Has A Heart, Underage Drinking
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-11-12
Updated: 2016-07-19
Packaged: 2018-02-25 02:07:57
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 2,997
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2604662
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CrumblingAsh/pseuds/CrumblingAsh
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>(a collection of Tony/Bruce drabbles, one-shots, and prompt fills - prompts <b>closed</b>)</p><p>Chapter 1: Canon - Bruce realizes he's in love<br/>Chapter 2: Alpha/Omega, Modern-Setting AU<br/>Chapter 3: High school AU<br/>Chapter 4: Canon/Angsty-first time AU, pt. 1</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Drowning

* * *

 

It happens the way it’s supposed to, slow and sudden and stopping.

 

Tony’s hunched over the table, the light of the display screen reflecting off the sweat on his face in a way that mimics the reactor in his chest. He’s rambling off schematics, lips twisted in a smile that’s bitingly amused and twitches on every fifth stroke of his fingers over the keys. Somewhere in his mind, Bruce is following every word, formulating current and future responses and bouncing up possible agreements and arguments as quick as the ones before fall, until he actually turns to look at the other man.

 

Bruce looks at Tony every day, _has_ looked at him every day for the past eight months – it’s impossible, living with someone as electric and gravitating as Tony Stark, to not focus in your attention at some point during a day. Yesterday, he had seen a genius, a messiah, a man he tentatively considers his best friend. Minutes ago, he had seen a genius, a messiah, a man he tentatively considers his best friend.

 

He looks now, and it’s not Tony he sees, but _Tony_ , sees formulas and thoughts, bruises and self-hate, charm and snark, and a desire to better this world and a need to survive long enough to _see it._ For that split second it’s like he’s drowning, gasping for breath and only sucking in water, sinking under something and not alarmed to be losing it.

 

“-ight? Bruce?” Brown eyes are narrowed toward him, curious, because Tony is always curious, always needs to know everything, always knows when there is something _to_ know.

 

Bruce remembers falling in love with Betty, remembers treading water just to keep his head above the surface so he never had to look away from her.

 

“Right,” he responds, disconnected as his stomach twists in sickening pleasure as the billionaire snorts at the obvious lie.

 

Tony’s the whole damn ocean, swallowing him down or helping him float. Bruce doesn’t need to tread.


	2. Hit So

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _**Omegaverse. Alpha!Bruce, Omega!Tony, Protective Bruce.** _
> 
>  
> 
> _Under the rain, Bruce hears the cry before he catches the scent._

* * *

 

 

By the time the violent roar of thunder cries out, the lights of the café have already flickered in fear from the lightning that had screamed it.

 

Over the counter, Bruce shares a tight grimace with the young barista as he exchanges his cash for the lidded cup of coffee in her hand. On a good morning of clear skies and sunshine, the inner city is hellish. On a morning plagued with thunderstorms, well – life is hard enough, and it’s no small part of him that is grateful that he won’t be the one mopping up the splattered mess of rainwater dragged inside by soaked and irritated customers (he remembers those days – long days of too much standing and not enough pay, working every available hour and covering every sick shift just to make money to barely cover rent and food, of ducking his head at scrutinizing gazes because _Alphas don’t do omega work, Robert-)_

_Don’t start, Banner,_ he growls to himself, an old practiced warning.

 

He waves off the cashier’s attempt to return his change, nodding toward the _Tips_ jar, lips quirking at the delighted smile she gives in return. She’s a tiny thing, thin and light and untested, and he’s not surprised to see the pink collar of _Family_ fastened securely around her neck to warn off and mark her omega status. It’s clean, obviously cherished, and undoubtedly a Beta family member lurks in the back, half working and half keeping an ear open for any problem that comes her way. It’s not uncommon these days, hiring a family member along with an omega for protection and extra service, and her obvious ease makes his smile grow as he steps away to make room for the next patron. It’s a small step forward, but it’s good. It’s _good_.

 

The coffee is warm against the palm of his hand, its aroma dancing up to his senses as moves back toward the door. The lights above flicker again, a skipped beat in a pulse, and he sucks in a deep breath of warmth and coffee before pushing open the glass door and stepping into the morning downpour.

 

Manhattan is as relentless as it is mesmerizing; under the sunlight it gleams and embraces and ignores, but under the cover of clouds and water it bites and pushes and drowns. Umbrellas are a nuisance he can’t afford, and within seconds his brown blazer is drenched black and the curls of his hair are plastered to his head, drops rolling from the strands and down his cheeks. The sidewalks are a mess of rush and grumbles, the clacking of heels and the slaps of shoes as people dash from one building to another, an endless trail of ants in a colony, always moving.

 

(In truth, Manhattan doesn’t suit Bruce. At thirty-four he’s yet to grow out of his introverted personality, and the constant crushing weight of the crowded population, while ignorant of his existence, is exhausting. He much prefers the city’s outskirts, towns just shy of being too small, streets one car from being too noisy, with grass and space and where unmated Alphas aren’t chased after or judged due to lack of attachment. But science isn’t suited to smaller populations, and military contracts _definitely_ don’t form in unambitious towns, so he’s here. Here, in Manhattan, surrounded by too many people and too tall buildings and the ever-looming threat of giving in to his instincts and proving just who the _dominant Alpha in this city really fucking is_ -)

 

_“No.”_

It’s faint, breathy and _weak,_ and hits Bruce like a paralyzing bullet to the spine.

 

Alleys on this street are junky, ruined, best left to ignorance and garbage, always empty save the lonely and desperate. But standing beside the aged soaking brick, unmoving, he can _smell it_ , over the coffee and the rain – the tangy scent of pain and need and _slick._

The excitement of three Alphas over the terror of an omega in heat.

 

_“Stop.”_

(“Stop, Brian. _Please, please.”)_

He’s inside the alley before his mind registers the difference between memory and present, the coffee a splattered mess of searing heat against his feet that he doesn’t feel as his mind fills with the familiar dreaded haze of instinct and anger, the scent leading him like a leash to trip over rubble and trash and toward the sweet scent of panic and the intruding laughter looming over it.

 

(“Bruce, go. Honey, just go. It’ll be fine; I’ll be fine.”)

 

The Alphas are standing behind a shredded dumpster and an empty doorway, shielded from the rain but soaked anyway – they reek of lust and pride and hormones, their mirth dirty and wrong under the roll of thunder. They don’t register his presence until he’s right on top of them, a thought’s reach from their skin, and Bruce isn’t _normal_ , isn’t _safe_ , is _angry and fueled and hemorrhaging rage_ in every soft, punched breath, and reaches out because he _hadn’t been able to before._

Their amusement dies with the crunch of the bone of the elbow of the Alpha he grabs.

 

They should fight him – unclaimed omegas are free game to any Alpha, it’s the law, it’s their right, and when they turn to face him they should be lunging, lashing out. But he can feel the surge in his body, feel it bleed into his face, and he knows they can see.

 

_“Leave.”_ It’s a snarl, burning his throat, and they’re Alphas, but they dart, wide-eyed and _submissive_ , self-preservation winning over their lust (in the back of his mind, he’s glad they’re not so stupid as to challenge him, but at the forefront it’s disappointment, a need to chase and rip and destroy-)

 

A whimper, timid and aching, slices through the fog of fury like the will of Moses, and suddenly Bruce sees the huddled form of the omega at his feet. Male, he realizes belatedly. A man, smaller than Bruce, older than the Alphas who had cornered him.

 

(“You’re a good boy, Bruce.” His mother’s soft, bruised hand against his aching cheek. “You’re good.”)

 

His knees hit the cement with a burst of agony he doesn’t register, soaking in pebbles and water and his hands instinctively reach out. Eyes crack open, a sliver of rich anguished brown swimming in bloodshot white, and the other man flinches back, pulling in on himself in a manner so obviously painful that empathy buries the temptation of his heat.

 

“Don’t,” he gasps out. It sounds like a plea.

 

“It’s…” Bruce swallows, lifting his hands slightly, _‘look, they’re empty. I’m in control, I won’t hurt you. It’s alright.’_ “It’s okay. You’re” _safe now_ is a lie. “You’re going to be okay. But you have to let me help you.”

 

“ _Alpha.”_ Hissed, accusing. There’s a wet gurgle to the word, a hard rasp of breath to produce it, and the omega is drawing back again, trying to get away despite being unable to move. The shift exposes more of his body, the high quality of his torn clothes, the shine of untied shoes, the gleam of the expensive watch around his wrist that held nowhere near the value of his body. There’s blood on the exposed skin of his ankles – Bruce bites back another snarl at the implication, _too many implications-_

_“Bruce,”_ he instead corrects, pushing his name over the title, separating. The man’s eyes crack open again, still agonized, still terrified, but with a gleam of something sharper, the pinpoint of distrust on the sword of intelligence. “I’m just _Bruce_. And I’m _asking you_ to let me help you.” (who had ever asked his mother, cared at all?). The man’s eyes shutter along with another hitched breath. His arms twitch, and Bruce’s eye is caught by the glimmer of gold clutched in the stark-white grip of the trembling hand.

 

A collar. The traditional black of _Familial Property_ , engraved and-

 

Cleanly cut in half.

 

Bruce swallows again, and this time when he reaches out, it’s slow and aimed high, light over the man’s shoulder and nowhere else; doesn’t pull back at the resulting flinch.

 

“Please let me help you,” he says softly. “ _Please.”_

It feels like years before the dark head nods, short and _defeated,_ and the sigh that whooshes from Bruce’s chest is exhausted. He slinks his arms _slowly, carefully_ under the thin body, bites against the fearful tension and wetness of slick and blood that coats him at the contact, and when he lifts the omega it’s with barely a physical effort and with more strain than he’s felt in twenty years. Warmth. There’s so much warmth.

 

Bruce turns from the entrance to the busy street and toward the opposite exit of the alley, to the sound of fewer steps, the presence of fewer people. His apartment is only a few blocks away, a rundown building beneath his _Alpha status_ and all the emptier for it, a first-aid kit kept perfectly stocked for reasons he’s never admitted to himself. He rubs his chin over the smaller man’s head with the scarcest hint of pressure. The beast inside rises up again, interest peaked at the marking of an omega, and he stabs it down with violence kept internal. A protection, warding off Alphas in the presence of heat. Nothing more.

 

“Tony.” It’s muttered against his shoulder, sudden and worn and brittle. Bruce hears it perfectly. “Ju-just don’t-.”

 

“I’m going to help you, Tony,” he cuts off, firm and gentle.

 

Doesn’t acknowledge when he feels Tony draw the arm holding the cut collar closer.

 

 

 

* * *

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **Prompted from yodahulk on tumblr: " _I would very much like an omegaverse story. I'm not picky as to who is the A, and who is the O. I have nothing specific I need to happen. However you want to handle it is fine with me. I just love them in this setting. Thanks!!_ "**
> 
> Um, this may get more parts. It may not. I don't know.


	3. Grey

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **High School AU. Drabble. Howard Stark's A+ Parenting. Underage drinking.**
> 
>  
> 
>  
> 
>  
> 
> _Low days are low days, and it's probably a bad idea, but Bruce brings the beer anyway._

* * *

 

 

Tony smirked around his cigarette, coughing out a chuckle in a sound that mixed between cool and pathetic. “Some days are low days,” he said informatively, as if he were a teacher and Bruce, his class. “These are usually the days where I care about the fact that my father doesn’t particularly like me. And I mean _care_. It’s horrific, it bothers me so much that he doesn’t really want anything to do with me, that I am not important as a person **_God_** , tell me you brought beer, Brucie, because I really think underage drinking is the only thing that can solve this.”

 

Bruce cocked his head, purposefully hiding the six-pack behind him as he considered his friend. Low days and dads. He knew all about shitty, motherfucking low days and dads. “The last time we engaged in underage drinking, we ended up in bed together.” It seemed important to point that out.

 

This time, the sound from Tony’s mouth was laughter, the cigarette tipping dangerously between his lips. “I remember that. Maybe this time we’ll actually fuck.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Inspired by the [Little Wonders](http://archiveofourown.org/series/218213) series by ElleWrites, because it's lovely and the atmosphere is inspiring as fuck. Cross-posted on tumblr.


	4. We're Just Bullet Points, pt.1

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **Canon AU. Past rape. Rape recovery. Aftermath of torture. Hurt/Comfort**
> 
>  
> 
> _They talk about making a list, and Tony jokes that maybe he’s too ruined to try this with Bruce._
> 
> _Bruce doesn’t laugh, but he says the same about himself._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Note:** This story does not contain any actual rape scenes. However, past rape is discussed in fragmented detail and painful, whispered confessions that may be triggering.

* * *

 

 

“Stark,” Tony says flatly, his back to the room – if he’s talking to anything, visually, it would be the cabinet that holds a small portion of his vast collection of mugs.

Bruce looks up from his oatmeal, spoon still steaming in front of his mouth. Traces his eyes over the tense shoulders and the skin on the back of the neck that burns.

“Don’t call me that,” Tony finishes. “Don’t call me Stark.”

And so, unofficially, begins their list.

 

 

 

 

_Kisses are safe, because those had never happened._

 

 

 

 

“Come on,” Tony cajoles from the other side of the screen.

Bruce spares him a glance over the batch of numbers that should theoretically be working but aren’t – there’s no smirk to match the wheedling of the billionaire’s tone, and though his eyes are dancing, the sparks are more just of life, of need, than anything teasing.

His hands twitch, together, at the same time; he wishes he were smaller.

“…You don’t have to-.”

“Don’t ask me if I like it,” Bruce blurts out – they both step back. He sighs. “Don’t tell me how much _you_ like it, either.”

 

 

 

 

_Tony likes to butt their heads together, soft, nuzzle him in a manner befitting a cat, before sharing a chaste kiss Bruce never has to stretch for._

_Bruce will wait for Tony’s nod, and brush the backs of his fingers over the arch of his cheek, and just rest their lips together for as long as their stillness lasts._

 

 

 

 

“I have to be able to breathe.” It’s a muttered confession in the car; Bruce looks to Tony even though, again, Tony isn’t looking at him.

But the city lights flash glows and shadows on his face, and Bruce can see the expression that contorts his features – the weights of a memory pulling at his skin.

“Just … sometimes … they’d … water and … while … damn it-.” White-knuckles on a charcoal steering wheel.

“You don’t have to tell me,” Bruce interrupts gently, turns as much as the seatbelt will let him. “I won’t … you don’t have to … can I hold your hand?”

“I _am_ driving.”

Bruce doesn’t ask again – there’s no need. He’s reached for, anyway.

“I used to be into the kinky shit.” Tony doesn’t sound half as bitter about it as he has the right to.

Their fingers don’t interlace, but their grips are solid, anchoring, joined.

 

 

 

_Holding hands. Tony gripes. Bruce blushes._

_God, but they laugh a lot._

 

 

 

 

“Please don’t ask me to scream.”

Bruce’s Iron Man pajama pants always make Tony grin, but his words are like falling naked onto sharp, tiny, shattered pieces of glass.

This time, he’s the one who doesn’t look.

“They always wanted me to scream,” he says into his pillow. “Every time.”

The bed dips. There’s enough of a space between them that the heat of another body isn’t immediately felt.

“You don’t have to tell me, either, you know,” Tony says after a beat of silence. “There’s never going to be a need for an explanation. Not … with me. Okay?”

The bed feels safe.

 

 

 

 

_But that’s as far as it can go._

_Anything further, and … Tony flinches, Bruce growls; they both hide. And they both hate it._

 

 

 

 

“Lights on,” Tony offers, flipping through printed readouts he can’t actually be reading. _They’d cover my head. I never got to see._

“No blocking the eyes at all, I think,” Bruce responds casually, dropping more papers into his pile. _They’d blindfold me, try to surprise me._

“Don’t … call me a whore.” The hesitation over the word is audible, but the rest spill out as if there’s a crack in the wall the other man has built. “Or a slut. Or a bitch-.”

“Or a monster.”

The papers drop to the table, as useless as they are, and finally, their eyes meet.

Bruce tries to smile and can’t. “Don’t restrain me.” It feels like it should be a request, and it’s not. “Don’t pull my hair.”

“Don’t tell me how good I am,” Tony whispers; his eyes almost look like they’re watering. “Don’t tell me … don’t tell me to take it.”

 

 

 

 

_They talk about making a list, and Tony jokes that maybe he’s too ruined to try this with Bruce._

_Bruce doesn’t laugh, but he says the same about himself._

 

 

 

 

“They never touched my skin.” Bruce just says it. He doesn’t mean to, it just comes out, and Tony startles. “I mean, not with their skin. No, ah, I mean … no skin-to-skin contact. Maybe it was about my blood. Maybe it was just, you know, _me?_ They always wore gloves. Used restraints. Found an instrument or, uh, two that they thought could get the reaction they wanted. And, you know, rubbers.” If he laughs, he’ll gag, and if he gags he’ll puke. “I think … I had seven … in the room. At once. Lots of … latex. But no one … no one touched me.”

He expects, maybe, an argument. He expects, more likely, anger – they’ve avoided outright sharing, have cringed at and excused away even the vaguest of implications.

Now, Tony just turns toward him, and though his face is neutral, his eyes are whispering – _it’s okay, we can do this, I’m here, I want to help._ Tony and his goddamn talkative eyes.

This one, Bruce wants to make a request: Can you? Will you? Please? But there isn’t one question mark on the list. He bites his tongue, Tony tilts his head, and fuck.

“Touch me.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **Anonymous asked: (Backround: Past non-con/rape; Tony/Afghanistan, Bruce/Ross's Men) After months of being in a relationship knowing eachothers pasts they make love for the first time. Looking for mushy, heartwarming fic ;)**
> 
> This is either part 1 of 2 or part 1 of 3.

**Author's Note:**

> **[Tumblr](http://ashnapalm.tumblr.com/)**
> 
> **At the top of each story/chapter is a summary and its own set of warnings - not all tags belong to all entries, but please be aware of them before starting a new entry.**


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